In the second installment of the “Divergent” series, “Insurgent” (opening March 20), the visual world grows more expansive, one faction at a time.

Based on novels by Veronica Roth, the series presents a post-apocalyptic Chicago
as a walled city where citizens have been segmented into five factions
based on their skills and temperaments: Amity, Candor, Dauntless,
Abnegation and Erudite. Those who don’t fit in are Factionless, while
others, including Tris (Shailene Woodley), possess qualities from all factions and are Divergent, which leaders see as a threat.

While the first film
spent much of its time in Dauntless, the new movie puts other factions
on screen. The filmmakers didn’t follow the novel’s design ideas, opting
to create a world that would capture the spirit of Ms. Roth’s words.
Much of the creative approach differed from the first film, with the
directing baton being passed from Neil Burger to Robert Schwentke, and production design duties moving from Andy Nicholson to Alec Hammond (“Donnie Darko,” “Non-Stop”).

“When
we were designing all of these factions, we had specific conversations
about each faction having its own visual identity,” Mr. Hammond said by
phone from Atlanta, where he was working on “Allegiant,” the next film in the series.

Amity
and Factionless — each on screen for the first time — couldn’t look
more different. One is a bright, agrarian utopia. The other is a dark,
gothic, makeshift world underground.

Photo

The Amity faction in "Insurgent."
Credit
Andrew Cooper

Good Hearts, Green Hues

Once Tris is exposed as Divergent, she goes on the run and finds
sanctuary with the good-hearted Amity. This faction offers a view of
something rarely seen in post-apocalyptic films: nature. There are
gardens, greenery and a giant dome with a tree in its center. Amity
produces food and goods for the others.

“We wanted to make sure
that it felt like a working place,” Mr. Hammond said. To convey the
mores of a community focused on peace and service, the designers settled
on a circle motif.

“We wanted the dome also to be virtually
indistinguishable from the landscape and the environment around it,” he
said. The top is made from frosted glass, and the bottom is open air.
Lines along the interior create a spiral that wraps around the dome,
creating a circular connection between land and architecture.

“It’s
idyllic in many ways, and we wanted it to feel that way because it’s a
world that is alien to Tris,” Mr. Hammond said. The character arrives at
Amity angry and shaken, so the peacefulness in the design contrasts
with her emotional state.

Photo

The interior of Factionless in "Insurgent."
Credit
Andrew Cooper

Scavengers Need Space

The other factions believe that those who are Factionless are nomads
and outcasts. But they are actually a fully functioning community.

“There
had to be something in the set that allowed you to believe that this
could be literally underground and never be noticed from anybody above,”
Mr. Hammond explained. “We kept coming up with these oddly shaped
cubicle ideas, trying to find infrastructure that would suggest that. We
looked at storm sewer runoff drains, large-scale water systems
underneath cities.”

Those provided the basis for this almost
“Hollywood Squares”-style living quarters, where a collection of
concrete panels stacked on top of one another open up to a central area.
The set was built on a soundstage in Atlanta and dressed with all manner of repurposed items. Each small space has its own personality.

“They’re
the faction of scavengers, the faction of make-do,” Mr. Hammond said.
“We tried to show that with light, the kinds of fixtures they had.” The
idea, he added, was that it would look nothing like, say, the organized
aisles of Home Depot.

They
changed the lighting schemes using different translucencies of plastic
and also some natural light sources, holes where shafts of light could
creep in from above.